Santa Cruz Banana Slugs Stand Up

UC Santa Cruz students, faculty and staff rallied on Thursday, promoting our campaign to keep the doors open to higher education to Central Coast students. Participants at the rally used mobile action stations to send letters to Senator Anthony Cannella and other legislators urging them to protect the UC system from the extreme cuts that some have been promoting as a short sighted attempt to solve California’s budget problems.

Melissa Garcia, a student at UCSC called on Senator Cannella to keep the opportunity of higher education accessible to students across the state.

“My parents knew that education was the only way for our family to get out of the fields and on the path to the American Dream of a middle-class life. We’re here today to ask Senator Cannella to stand up for students from Hollister, Salinas, Livingston and other towns in his district for whom college is the only way out of the cycle of poverty.”

At the rally, Alum Sandino Gomez worried about the consequences of gutting the funding to California public higher education.

“The dream of higher education was passed down by my family who instilled in me a work ethic and an appreciation for education because they wanted a better future for the next generation. If we don’t maintain the revenues the Governor is proposing, I worry that California will have squandered the precious gift of a world-class university system that has been passed down from generation to generation.”

Following the event, rally participants drove to Senator Cannella’s Salinas office to deliver their message directly.